MP3: The Impact of Watching Police Killings

The good news about the use of camera phones, body and dash cams is that police are finally starting to be held accountable for their wrongdoing. But the downside is that we as the public may be getting desensitized and traumatized from constant viewing:
The fear of becoming the next Rodney King is still here. But what has changed is how often we are viewing that fear being realized. Citizens have taken the upgraded ... Source: balloon-juice.com

This is the seal of upstate New York town Whitesboro. The name alone gives one pause. But the seal–of a white man choking a Native American–is even more questionable. And even better, the mayor of the town has argued that it’s not problematic at all:
“I could understand why people would have concern about it. But, [as with] everything else, I think you have to take all the facts into consideration. And if peo...

Sometimes you just have to acknowledge the incredible entertainment value of gotcha journalism. Thus was the result of Nancy Grace having rapper 2 Chainz on her show to talk about marijuana. Per usual, Nancy Grace was ridiculous, often referring to the rapper by his former moniker “Titty Boy,” while the rapper was actually very calm and reasonable. Pulitzer prize-winning stuff, guys.
Team Blackness also discusse...

Last week, Michael Eric Dyson dropped “The Ghost of Cornel West” in the New Republic, a novella more than an article about what he sees as the fall of Cornel West and all he represents:
West has sacrificed friendships and cut ties with former comrades because he insists that only outright denunciation of Obama will do. It is a colossal loss for such a gifted man to surrender to unheroic truculence: If a mind is ...

San Jose Police Are Reviewing Officer’s Behavior After Threatening Tweets To Protesters: http://t.co/rDW3TgVf0r pic.twitter.com/GtCR7Ky7Yk
— Chris Geidner (@chrisgeidner) December 14, 2014
Sometime people forget that others can see their tweets, especially their employers. So you can imagine the controversy San Jose police officer Phillip White who had the above delightful things to say in response to protestors...

You may not know that a bomb went off outside the Colorado Springs NAACP building on Tuesday morning, unless, that is, you’re on Twitter. By Tuesday night #NAACPBombing was the number 1 trending topic on Twitter. But as far as mainstream media coverage, there was very little:
In a time when racial tensions in our country appear to be growing, the troubling nature of this act of domestic terrorism should be blatantl...